


alis grave nil

by ghostblade



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Adopted Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), Adopted TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Antarctic Empire, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Dadza!, Dream Smp, Found Family, Gen, Platonic Relationships, Pre-Canon, Protective Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), SMP Earth - Freeform, Wilbur Soot and Technoblade and TommyInnit are Siblings, Winged Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-15 22:08:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29321412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostblade/pseuds/ghostblade
Summary: "For the first ten years of his son’s life, it was Phil and Wilbur against the world. On the ninth anniversary of their meeting (now celebrated as Wilbur’s tenth birthday), Phil finally decides to stop travelling. Wilbur is antsy and impatient these days, always finding himself in trouble and chaos, attracting danger and barely outsmarting it, coming back to Phil with the lopsided, cheeky grin Phil had fallen in love with, and a plea to be patched up. Wilbur needs order and stability. So they find a village just off the coast of an island Phil had passed through in his army days, and Phil teaches Wilbur how to build a house from brick and concrete instead of wood and stone."after war, fame, and death, Phil resigns himself to a mundane life. the only indicators of his past are quick instincts, flawless skill and wings surgically attached to his back.the problem is, Phil seems to attract trouble, and with bizarre encounter after bizarre encounter, he realises his life will never truly be mundane.(a brief history of the sleepy boys before and during the dream smp, focusing on the family and taking many liberties with canon)
Relationships: Wilbur Soot & Technoblade & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
Comments: 4
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> alis grave nil: - nothing [is] heavy with wings

I will not be starting the story from the beginning. I ask you not to feel slighted by this decision, reader - trust my assessment that the beginning is not particularly anything of note or interest. To satiate your hunger to fill the void the undisclosed past will inevitably leave, I will provide a brief summary of the ordinary, uneventful early years. 

A young man - boy, really; not quite eighteen - who has scarcely left his village yearns for adventure, and finds it in signing himself up to fight in a war. He’s strong, powerful, declared undefeatable by the time he’s 20, and becomes a world-renowned hero - bestowed upon him the greatest of gifts, more wealth than any one man can need, and the most advanced healthcare that exists. They win the war - locals claim  _ he  _ won the war, and he becomes the most expensive mercenary hero in all the land, a household name who is spoken about as indestructible, able to face any challenge and overcome it. Hardcore. 

Until he is sent on what should have been a simple quest to clear out a ravine a small village is too afraid to mine in. He’s done it countless times, killing monsters feels like second nature at this point, and they are always the quickest and easiest missions he is sent on - almost boring in their simplicity. But he’s tired, overworked from days of battling and nights of revelling in his fame in all the best ways, and he’s injured, weak from a lack of sleep, off his guard because of the mundanity of the task at hand. So when he’s cornered by a baby zombie in full gold armour, a spider, and a creeper blocking the entryway to the ravine and relentlessly attacking as he tries to enter, he falters, caught off guard and desperate as he flails his sword recklessly, barely landing a hit. 

The next thing he remembers he is waking to the news he is disgraced. The world’s biggest laughing stock - bred for war, indestructible to all except a child. He wakes to the grim face of his mentor, who tells him it’s over, he is no longer the  _ Hardcore Philza  _ he was known as, and it’s time to move on. 

“This is the last time we will see each other,” he says in the solemn, professional voice Phil has grown used to hearing. “It’s time to grow up.” 

Phil sits up and stretches for the first time since his death. It feels like the bed rises with him, stuck by sweat to his back - he blames it on the drugs he must be on and reaches out his arms, pops his shoulders and tries to stretch the strange feeling out of his back. It doesn’t work; he figures perhaps this, like his newfound disgrace, is just another thing to get used to. He cracks his neck, turns his head to either side and finally spots them - flashes of white bone and feather stretching out past his shoulders on either side. His mouth drops open.

“Elytra…” he says, barely above a whisper, as though afraid if he says it out loud, it will cease to be. Perhaps admitting to seeing it will cause him to realise it’s all a potion-induced illusion after all. He’d begged for an elytra from the day the war had been won, always shot down by his mentor with “ _ when you grow up. _ ” But they don’t disappear when he speaks.

His mentor, for the first time since Phil met him, smiles. “It’s… a little more permanent than an elytra.” He shrugs. “Call it a parting gift.” And Phil flounders, lost for words and lost in the world, no idea where to go from here but full with the knowledge that wings will take him anywhere. Call it a spark of hope, newfound ambition. His mentor turns to leave but falters in the doorway for a moment, turning back. “Don’t fly too close to the sun,” he advises, then promptly walks out of the makeshift infirmary and out of Phil’s life forever. 

With the ending of the first chapter of Phil’s life, perhaps I should end my chapter. The second chapter does sound like an interesting place for our story to truly start. However, we are not done yet. 

Phil lies low as he heals, keeping to his underground base (within a ravine, which he tells himself is purely coincidental) or the skies, never traversing land. His public image shifts from hero to disgrace to recluse, his name still on everyone’s lips, but this time solely in the form of questions. He decides he quite likes this - there’s a sense of mystery and notoriety to it that makes him feel more like the intimidating hero than someone so easy to defeat. 

He flies, he mines, he builds bases and spawners and farms and anything that makes life convenient, creating meaningless project after meaningless project to keep himself distracted and convince himself he’s grown up and mellowed out now. 

Life is mundane but easy and mostly peaceful. Until six months after his recovery, he wakes to an unfamiliar noise. As he comes to, he feels a fear he didn’t know he could have crept up on him. The sounds of a high voice, crying into the night, feels too familiar and too eerie after his last death. But he’s grown up now, he promised himself he had. So he climbs out of bed, dons his best armour, his only netherite sword and his favourite enchanted bow with the arrows of harming, and heads up to the surface for the first time in almost a year. 

But there is no zombie, no baby zombie either, within his range of sight. The crying has died down and the surface is almost unnaturally silent. Must’ve been part of his dream, he thinks, taking a final step forward into the darkness to double-check before stumbling face-first into the mud. The crying starts up again, a powerful wail that seems to be coming from all sides yet is almost melodic in tone. He realises he has tripped over something and begins to seethe; must be some sort of sick prank someone thought was funny to play on him. He’s angry on multiple accounts: at the fact he’s been awoken by a prank; at the fact he panicked so much at the sound; at the fact this means his location has been compromised, and he’ll probably have to move and set up his whole base again. After all that hard work.

He grabs the prank-box with one hand and drags it underground to his base, where he can analyse the technicalities of it in the light. The crying has died down again in all the time he’s spent pondering, and he’s finally beginning to relax until the box is lit by the first lantern he approaches. Because there is something in the box after all, dormant but moving.

There’s a child in the box, a human one, barely a year old and fast asleep under a knitted blue blanket. The box is cardboard, soggy from the rain outside, but the sides are just protected enough that he can make out the message scrawled across it in dripping blue ink. 

_ ‘WILBUR IS YOUR SON.’ _

And it’s at that moment that Phil realises he isn’t half as grown-up as he thought he was, but he doesn’t have the option to lie to himself anymore. 

Our story will begin when he is grown. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> phil adjusts to new life, wilbur begins to grow, and right as they manage to settle down, a mysterious stranger reminds phil he can never catch a break 
> 
> "So he teaches Wilbur to be tougher as they travel - stops letting him avert his eyes while Phil kills livestock in front of him; teaches him how to use a sword, and when that fails, teaches him to use a bow and arrow instead; washes the blood from his son’s hands as he cries after shooting down his first sheep, and puts the animal out of its misery instead of healing it the way his son begs him to." 

For the first few years, Phil is convinced Wilbur is far too kind to be his son. He falls in love with Wilbur approximately two days in, when he wakes to find the child had escaped the cardboard box he liked to sleep in and was climbing the ladder that led to the surface with the dexterity of a kid twice his age. Phil had panicked and snatched him up into his arms away from the danger of falling, and as he’d tried to scold him he was met with a smile, equal parts angelic and mischievous, as though he knew exactly what he was doing. Phil couldn’t stay mad. 

On the four year anniversary of Wilbur’s arrival (a day he’d unofficially dubbed Wilbur’s fifth birthday), he finally leaves his well-loved base and heads out in search of people. It’s the end of his recluse era, and he’ll miss it dreadfully, but he has learnt to be less selfish these days, and Wilbur needs to be around people. He loves the kid, but he’s scared of anything that moves at this rate, and Phil has had it drilled into him from his youth that softness breeds weakness. 

So he teaches Wilbur to be tougher as they travel - stops letting him avert his eyes while Phil kills livestock in front of him; teaches him how to use a sword, and when that fails, teaches him to use a bow and arrow instead; washes the blood from his son’s hands as he cries after shooting down his first sheep, and puts the animal out of its misery instead of healing it the way his son begs him to. 

He learns in time. Phil tells Wilbur stories of gods and mercenaries and heroes, of great adventures and wars, and in the day he tells him that everything he teaches him is key knowledge for adventure. It works. Wilbur is an explorer by nature, always climbing and running off, analytical of situations in a way Phil never was - the brain to Phil’s brawn, and the social butterfly to Phil’s recluse. Because Wilbur loves people. He thrives in their company. Phil sees himself in his son for the first time while watching him revel in the attention of the women of the village they’d been passing through after they’d overheard him singing an old sailor’s song Phil had taught him from his war days. 

For the first ten years of his son’s life, it was Phil and Wilbur against the world. On the ninth anniversary of their meeting (now celebrated as Wilbur’s tenth birthday), Phil finally decides to stop travelling. Wilbur is antsy and impatient these days, always finding himself in trouble and chaos, attracting danger and barely outsmarting it, coming back to Phil with the lopsided, cheeky grin Phil had fallen in love with, and a plea to be patched up. Wilbur needs order and stability. So they find a village just off the coast of an island Phil had passed through in his army days, and Phil teaches Wilbur how to build a house from brick and concrete instead of wood and stone. 

Despite his hesitations, Phil is surprised to find both he and Wilbur settle into their new life much better than he thought they would. Will, naturally, is still half-feral, but his new friend - the baker’s daughter - mellows him out more than Phil has ever been able to. It’s nice to have a community. He no longer has to constantly hunt; there is always food available, and a variety of which his son has never seen. Everybody has their place in the community, their own little specialist skill they can provide for the rest of the village with, and trade and exchange is rich with benefits. 

Life may be mundane, but it is safe and comfortable. Wilbur learns to play a variety of instruments from their neighbours and becomes something of a child performer, and Phil offers his skills as a local mercenary. He is turned down three times without explanation before he is  _ politely  _ informed that there are much younger, more agile mercenaries in town. His name still holds power, but these days his age and status as a father hold more, so the woman at the adventurer’s guild suggests perhaps his skills would be more useful as a  _ mentor _ instead. It makes him feel old beyond belief, but it’s a job, so he takes it. 

Surprisingly, Phil is a good mentor. Granted, he is usually teaching younger children survival techniques and battle strategies more than advising those who are actively adventuring, but he enjoys it all the same. Memories of his travels with Wilbur are laced into his daily activities, and it’s oddly comforting to use the same tactics he used on his son with some of the softer kids in the group. There’s undoubtedly something interesting about the journey his name has taken, from hero to disgrace to recluse to father to beloved mentor. Because his name is out there again, and this time he takes pride in it. People begin sending their children to the island for a matter of weeks or months to learn from  _ The  _ Philza himself, and they often return home with skills, wisdom, and praises hanging from their every word. Wilbur loves it too, declaring to everyone he meets that Phil is his  _ dad, _ and  _ how cool is that _ , and that alone is enough to leave Phil topful with joy and pride. 

And so he might not be flying, but it keeps him far away from the sun. 

Hold on, dear traveller. I know this journey has been quick and rather overwhelming with information. I am sure you are weary and impatient. Do not worry. This is common and natural. If you are looking for an escape, I promise you will be able to lose yourself soon. However, there is one more key person who must be introduced before our story can truly begin. 

Oh. Did you think it already had? Well. I must say, you are much easier to lose than most. Beware: if you escape too deeply, you may not be able to come back. Of this I am certain. Good luck.

It always seems to be the night in which events which change Phil’s life so entirely begin. And so, when he hears footsteps downstairs sometime in late February and hears the soft sound of Will’s sleeping breath one room over, he sighs, because he knows whatever is lurking downstairs has the capacity to alter his entire existence.

Of course, it could just be a mouse. This may all be for nothing. But Phil has a sixth sense for life-changing moments, and he’s never really been the kind to attract average rodents. So he instinctively puts on armour, pulls out the spare diamond sword that hangs over his bed, and heads downstairs. 

To be honest, he’d expected something a little more dangerous. As he enters his front room, he does not find a mob prepped for attack or a child wailing in the rain. First, he spots the purple glow of enchanted netherite armour - almost an extinct item in its rarity, Phil is said to be the only one who owns any for hundreds of miles. Next, he spots the sword with the same purple glow, but it’s held loosely between the figure’s index and middle fingers, brushing across the ground casually. The intruder in question is not instantly threatening. He is propped up on a stool around the table, chin resting in his hand looking almost bored. When Phil enters the room, he perks up.

“Thank god. I was beginning to think you’d never come. I know you’ve grown older but I didn’t think it’d take that long for you to get out of bed.” The voice is low, monotonous, and serious in tone despite the implications of his words. For a second, the figure reminds him of a less-expressive Wilbur.

“Don’t tell me you’re my long lost son.”   
  


The figure does not laugh; it is unclear whether he does not understand whether Phil is joking or simply doesn’t find him funny. The silence is intimidating all the same. “No.” He responds. “I want you to be my mentor.”   
  


It’s almost disconcerting how upfront he is, Phil observes. But he’s used to handling people hardened by life at this point, so he replies with equal directness. “It’s customary to sign up for that through the adventurer’s guild.” He knows there’s no point saying it; he’s almost certain the figure already knows this, but he hasn’t had to speak like this since his war days, so he’s a little unsure what to say.

The figure turns away from him, resting his chin in his hand again as he looks out of the window. “Won’t do. I’m looking for more of a… private arrangement. One to one.”

Something about the strangeness of the situation has Phil intrigued. He figures he should jump at any opportunity to make his life a little less mundane. “I’m sure that can be arranged.”

The figure remains silent. Phil realises he is going to have to do most of the legwork here. 

“I’m free every evening for about two hours before sunset, if that suits you?” It’s more of an assertion than a question. 

Nevertheless, the figure replies “No,” rather abruptly. “It has to be at night. In the dark.”

“I have a son.”

“And?”

“I can’t wake him to train a fussy mercenary. Sunset or nothing.”

“I won’t see you in the light.”

“Why?”

“I’m busy.”

“Then you’ll have to go elsewhere.” Phil knows, deep down, even as he says this, that it won’t be the end of things the way he thinks it will. Perhaps he even hopes so.

The figure does not budge. From the shadowy side-profile Phil can see, he juts his chin out in a stubborn gesture, up towards the moonlight streaming in through the window. Lit by the moonlight, Phil is granted barely a suggestion of the figure’s features; a sharp chin and jawline, an almost unnaturally angular face shrouded by some sort of mask that covers it. From what he can see, the mask seems to be constructed of a bone-like material, carved into the shape of a skeletal animal’s face, though he cannot decipher which. It’s an intensely striking image, and Phil can’t quite look away. 

“I can’t go elsewhere.”

“Why?”

The figure ruffles a hand through shoulder-length hair, looking wild in the shadows. 

“You’re already a mercenary.” This much is obvious from the figure’s behaviour and gear, the way he speaks and the way he holds himself and his sword. It is every textbook mercenary teaching to intense perfection. “Why do you need me? Who  _ are you _ ?” Phil pushes, making his way to a seat around the table, face-to-face with the masked stranger. He knows almost every mercenary in a fifty-mile radius, has mentored at least 50%, hired at least another 25% and stumbled upon the others in one way or another. Mercenary names are almost required information for villagers. 

“You’re the only one who can teach me.” The intruder insists evasively. 

“You’re not going to say no are you?” Comes a third voice from the doorway in which Phil had just been standing. Leaning against the door is Wilbur, a jumper thrown over his pyjamas and the heels of his hands rubbing his eyes in sleepy bemusement.

Phil barely spares his son a second glance. He does not like the idea of him getting involved in this. “Go back to bed, Wilbur”

“ _ No _ ,” Wilbur smiles, so casual it’s almost challenging. 

“Oh, is this your son?” Phil catches the gleam of the stranger’s smile in the moonlight as he speaks slowly and purposefully. He doesn’t like where this is going at all. 

“Leave him alone.” He utters through gritted teeth. “Don’t touch him.”   
  


The stranger laughs a low, humourless chuckle. “Oh  _ Phil,  _ I wasn’t going to.” He holds his hands up in mock surrender, sword clattering to the ground beneath him. Phil begins to doubt whether this man is a mercenary after all: every movement is a little too purposefully perfect, to the point of being cocky. Arrogance is drilled out of mercenaries from their very first day of training - Phil has broken enough people out of it himself.

“You can’t say no.” Wilbur interjects from the door again, and maybe Phil is a little too aggressive in his retort, but he’s worked up, hasn’t felt so out-of-control since he was a teenager, and it’s starting to grate on him that he can’t seem to exert any power over the situation.

So, though it’s aimed at the stranger, he hisses back to his son “Maybe if he told us his  _ name. _ ” 

Wilbur doesn’t flinch at harsh words anymore. He’s growing up, and growing an attitude immune to harshness. Phil’s proud of that, watching as his son ruffles a hand through his hair, face twisting to an odd expression for a moment before mellowing out. 

“I don’t  _ have  _ a name,” The stranger hisses back with equal fire. He takes a second, probably to calm his tone, before he speaks formally once again, though with a little more bite. “I’m rather well known for that,  _ actually. _ ”

At the exact same time, the penny drops for Phil and Wilbur, though his son gets there first. “You’re--”

“--The nameless mercenary.” Phil realises.

“--The Blade.” Wilbur finishes. Phil furrows his brow at his son, and it seems the stranger may be doing the same, as he turns away from the window for the first time to look at Wilbur. 

“I haven’t heard that one.” He addresses Wilbur.

Will ignores him. “Phil,  _ Dad, _ you have to say yes. He’s  _ exactly  _ the kind of person you’d have told me stories about. He’s, like, a legend. People say he’s the best mercenary out there since--”

“Since Philza himself.” The Nameless Mercenary finishes. 

Wilbur presses on, ecstatically rambling. “He’s like the best warrior known to man. People nickname him the blade because he’s said to be as deadly as a weapon himself, and apparently nobody has ever wielded a blade as well as him. He’s like everything you’d ever wanted me to be-”

And Phil feels guilty for that, because never once has he tried to push his name and legacy onto his son - he’s known from the start Wilbur wouldn’t want it, and was a firm believer that children should make their own path in life, but he supposes he can’t control his own shadow. 

“In that case,” He cuts in, unable to handle the guilt of Wilbur’s rambles any longer. “Why do you need me?”

“Because I’m the best  _ since  _ you. And I want to be better. You’re the only one who can teach me things I don’t already know. I need to be  _ pushed _ , Phil, I’m getting bored.”

Phil knows that feeling all too well. The Nameless Mercenary doesn’t even have wings. He sighs. “It’s the middle of the night.”   
  


“I need to keep a low profile.” 

“How about every midnight on weekdays?” Wilbur offers.

“Will--” Phil warns to no avail.

  
“You arrived here at midnight tonight so you already wanted that time.”

“I think your dad’s a little concerned I’m gonna keep you up at night,” The Mercenary drawls in a tone that tows the line between friendly and condescending. He sounds almost amused. 

Surprisingly, Wilbur is able to match his tone perfectly. “I don’t think I’m the one he should be concerned about.”

The Mercenary quirks his head. “Me?”

Wilbur smiles, slow and deliberate. It is always shocking to Phil how perceptive and social his son is, how easily he navigates situations and talks his way to some sort of victory, the manipulative little bugger. “Himself.”

“What does that mean?” He challenges his son.

“You’re getting old,” Wilbur offers cheerily. “Don’t worry about it old man, you won’t have to go up against the Big Bad Blade every night. You could mentor us together.”

“Will--” Phil hesitates. His son isn’t exactly a born and bred mercenary, and putting him up against the best in the business seems counterintuitive at best and outright dangerous at worst. “You don’t have to--”

“I’ve been wanting to learn for a while,” Will shrugs dismissively. Phil had tried to teach him the intricacies of combat a few years ago, but every time Wilbur either got bored, distracted, scared or injured. It wasn’t exactly his forte, and he’d always seemed comfortable with that. Phil couldn’t tell if this was a change of heart or an attempt to look cool in front of somebody Will clearly admired. “I can’t rely on you my whole life. I need to be able to defend myself.” He asserts.

All in all, it seems like a terrible idea. No sleep, having to put up with a mysterious and stubborn war hero in-training and his combat-shy son up against each other, having to dredge up old, bitter memories to remember more complex knowledge and all in an effort to dethrone himself as the greatest mercenary known to man. He couldn’t seem to see any benefit to the offer on the table at all.

So he says yes, of course. Because terrible ideas are at the very least interesting, and Phil’s been confined to the land for just a little too long.

And this, dear traveller, is where our story begins. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i see your "sbi family" and i see your "it doesn't make sense for techno to be phil's son" and I raise you: phil as techno's mentor. i am very excited about this. 
> 
> i haven't written properly in nearly five years so questions/comments/feedback of any kind would be super appreciated! if you enjoy, check out my tumblr (@ghostblaade) or my other fic 'memento mori' which is dream smp mythology!

**Author's Note:**

> hello! i'm really interested in different narrative styles at the moment so I'm trying out an active narrator style - any feedback on that would be greatly appreciated (or comments/kudos in general. i live for validation.) this is very much a mix of the background I've always had in mind for the sleepy boys set in a dnd style world, hence the heavy influence on villages and mercenaries, but it was the only way to make everything make sense within Minecraft so pls bear with me. i hope you enjoy! 
> 
> (i've already written about 3 chapters in one sitting so this will probably be updated again very soon.)
> 
> ((if you have questions, want updates, or just want to follow another dream smp liveblogger, I'm @ghostblaade on tumblr!))


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